Just joined the digital club...

[waferdog]

I've been a 35mm guy for many years now, and decided it was time to get into the digital world (mainly because I never seem to get my rolls of film developed). I have been looking around for a decent camera, but have not bought anything due to my excessive cheapness. Yesterday I found a deal that overcame the aforementioned cheapness. Digging through a pawn shop that is owned by a family friend, I saw a Sony DSC-S85 sitting in the display case. I couldn't see the price so I had the guy look at the tag. $300.00. Not bad, but considering that these are now retailing at $500 and that this one was at a pawn shop, I wasn't too sure about the deal. I checked out the camera and found a little surprise, 128 mb memory stick. That's $90 right there. The camera itself seemed pretty solid, all functions worked, it even had the stickers on it. Another problem. No power cable or PC cable. Called my friend who has the same camera. He has an extra power cable and a PC cable I could have. Cool. Went back to the counter and offered $250 for the camera. It was accepted and I am now the proud owner of this camera. Went out immediately and tested the camera some more (they would take it back if I found any problems). This thing takes beautiful pictures at 2272x1704, has all the features I could think of needing and seems quite user-friendly. Went out today and picked up a case for the camera and a PNY memory card reader for $15, which works great in transferring the pix.

DSC-S85 (http://www.sonystyle.com/is-bin/INTERSHOP.enfinity/eCS/Store/en/-/USD/SY_DisplayProductInformation-Start;sid=_Es-Re-Dm68-YtJpLfA0TqCMQDKepS8VQ4o=?ProductID=RKoKC0%2eNJPkAAADxLKBngL_j&Dept=dcc&CatalogCategoryID=FAAKC0%2eNGxAAAADx9NxngL_f)

Any opinions or things I should know about this camera?

Thanks for listening,

Waferdog

[yikes]

Great steal, it looks pretty solid! lets see some pics!


Welcome to the club!

YiKeS

[Dakota]

Awesome deal! Sony makes a great digi-cam and the Carl Zeiss glass is some of the best on the market today. You definitely scored on that deal!! Congrats.

[waferdog]

I have not had any time to really get some good pics, but I can give you a sampling of a couple we took when testing it out:

Testing material (http://pws.chartermi.net/~waferdog1/Labatt.jpg)

Macro test with XFL football (http://pws.chartermi.net/~waferdog1/football.jpg)

Pic taken a while back with friend's DSC-S85. The dog is Wafer, thus the explanation for my username. (http://pws.chartermi.net/~waferdog1/wafer.jpg)

Waferdog

[Randy]

I like the shot of the dog!

good to see another fellow canadian poster!

[downhill]

Wow, what a steal! 4 megapixel? Your going to be smiling for quite a while!

[waferdog]

Randy, I hope you don't mean me for that Canadian thing. I'm only a couple hours away from being Canadian, though. I'm assuming you are talking about Yikes.

The shot of Wafer was taken by my friend (he actually owns Wafer), as I mentioned. I liked it so much I use it as my wallpaper.

Downhill, I'm thinking I did get a heck of a deal on this thing. I do have one concern though. When the lense is telescoped out, there is a little play in it, while my friend's does not have that. I've been told that it is somewhat normal in lenses of this nature, and it does not seem to affect picture quality, so I'll just live with it.

Waferdog

[Amro]

i just bought a sony p9..the images are ok..but not gorgeous or anything :( but the s85 is NICE

[yikes]

Those pics are nice, but they dont look too sharp? Have you taken any full size shots, if so how do they look?

YiKeS

[waferdog]

yikes,

Those were full size shots that I sized down for posting. I'll throw up a full size image for you to ponder.

Caution: Big Football Image (http://pws.chartermi.net/~waferdog1/football2.JPG)

Let me know what you think

Waferdog

[yikes]

Bro, i wasnt trying to put you down @ all, I was just merely stating what i saw! :) the football pic looks real sharp! Once, again, good steal.

YiKeS

[waferdog]

Yikes,

I think my response was taken incorrectly. As this is a used camera, I want to make sure that it is up to par, so I posted the big picture for your perusal. Sorry for the misunderstanding and thanks for the help.

Waferdog

[Dakota]

Hint: If you anticipate resizing photos, then shoot them in an uncompressed mode such as TIF or whatever Sony uses. Compresssing a compressed (jpeg) file not only reduces the size, BUT the quality as well. Kinda like like making a photocopy of a photocopy.

[Amro]

unfortunately...at least my p9...doesn't offer an uncompressed mode..jpeg and mpeg modes are all it has.. no raw tiff mode

[waferdog]

Dakota,

Thanks for the tip. This camera definitely has a Tiff mode. I tested it out and it works fine. The file sizes aren't necessarily that much bigger than the jpg files, as I had anticipated.

Waferdog